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A drugged up driver with multiple DUIs plowed into a family on a sidewalk and brutally killed two little kids. It is hard to imagine something worse. Yet nothing will be done. Nothing will change. Car culture in this country is that toxic and pervasive. Drivers will get more mad about the cyclist they saw roll through a stop sign 3 weeks ago than they will about these two kids killed by a driver.

Vision Zero talks about ending all traffic injuries and fatalities. Sounds nice right? Except drivers around here are killing MORE people every year. How the hell do you get to zero if the number keeps going up?

Even deaths don't spur immediate action from city and/or state regarding safety. Its been how many weeks since that cyclist was killed near the Museum of Science, whats been done in that area to address it? I haven't seen anything on my commute.

There is an intersection near my house where I his hit by a motorist that rolled through a stop sig and hit me. Cracked my helmet and sent me to the hospital. There have been multiple car crashes here before and since then, one just this past week. My girlfriend was almost hit by someone while she was in the crosswalk last week, my roommate almost hit just last night. My other roommate that drives says hes had a few close calls. And its right around the corner from a BPD station.

Nothing. Has. Been. Done. Instead we get to hem and haw about the specific details of something, we have to suspend outrage and wait until "all the facts" are in because who knows what tiny sliver of blame there is to place on the victim. But we know exactly what the problem is here, reckless driving, poor enforcement, car-centric infrastructure and a culture of indifference that just throws its arms up and says "oh well, what can you do, so tragic."

The police cannot be everywhere and they've failed to keep our streets safe from this epidemic, traffic enforcement seems to be beneath them.

Speed and traffic cameras now, amend the state constitution, make an emergency argument about saving the lives of children. I don't care about the cases of corruption in Chicago, I care about safer streets more than your wallet/pocket book.

I understand I risk sounding un-empathetic given the circumstances but I truly believe it is unfair to begin the all out assault on cars and drivers every time something like this happens. Yes, no one deserves to lose their life at the hands of some one else being reckless. The sad fact is accidents happen all the time, sometimes involving cars and sometimes involving other things. Yes people do get hit by drivers being irresponsible. However the overwhelming majority or drivers make it home safe and sound every night.

Nope, that ain't working. We need pro-active, not reactive strategies to deal with the epidemic of road violence. The dutch framed their safe street advocacy around saving children's lives and its time we do the same.

And please, I'm not defending the driver. She should go to jail. I can't stress that enough. Too many people die every year from car accidents. I just don't think any of the solutions offered here will work.

Which is it? See thats the issue with language like that, reckless driving isn't accidental. You can argue that they didn't intend to kill anyone but the consequences of their actions was a death, its not an accident.

Preventive measures can and do solve this kind of garbage. Real consequences for reckless driving need to do doled out and hit people in the wallet and/or remove their privilege to drive. Its real simple.

You're not defending the driver, you're just not offering anything else except "oh well" and "thoughts and prayers" and doubting that anything can be done. Super helpful.

First, we really do not know, as of yet what happened. The driver might of fallen asleep at the wheel. Whatever happened, it is a horrible accident that occurred here.

Repeat after me, most people, 99.9% of people, do not hop in their autos each morning wanting to kill, kill, kill. To argue consequences of actions is silly. Whether they killed someone or not, it is still an accident that involved a car.

So, let us say, that we take her driver's license away and perhaps create a database with her name in it so that she can't even purchase a car if she tried (that would take some doing). Unless we execute her, there will always be a chance that she will say borrow a car from a friend or family member, drive and get into another accident. So do we throw her in jail for what, 5, 10, 20 years, for life? But she did not intentionally kill (as in premeditated murder) this sweet innocent. Yet her actions may have. It is not simple at all.

"we don't know what happened"
"It could have been a medical emergency"
"The sun was in their eyes"
"They came out of no where"
"I saw a pedestrian jay-walking the other day"

Nope, its a preventable crash. Stop calling it an accident.

Repeat after me. Preventive measures. That means road diets, automated enforcement, strict liability laws, GPS-tracking of all cars, governors to prevent speeding, stricter testing at early and later ages, getting ride of overside SUVs. Oh you're worried she might get behind the wheel again? Fantastic, I'm sure the tech industry can innovate here, fuck it some invasive way of detecting a persons identity and clearance to drive a car. Just spitballin here.

Motorists start being held to a higher standard of real consequences that impacts their wallet and ability to drive will bring about real change. Jailtime too but don't distract from the conversation at hand, we are talking about how to stop this epidemic and you want to split hairs and repeat the same drivel about not jumping to conclusions. I continue to say it, these are preventable incidents of road violence. You continue to offer zero solutions.

This is sounding strikingly similar to the gun control debate but the great thing here is there isn't a Amendment that guarantees your right to drive a car. We should legislate on that.

It corrects 75 years of auto industry propaganda. From the 30’s when citizens asked for speed goveners on new cars to the invention of jaywalking. None of the actions that created this crash were Accidents.

We hold so many other people responsible for their "accidents". Construction companies, Surgeons, Infrastructure Workers, Babysitters. When you're doing something that affects the wellbeing of other people, you are held to a standard of vigilance and responsibility. It's not an "accident" just because somebody is tired and does their thing, KNOWING they're incapable of preforming at the expected standard. If a surgeon nods off in the middle of your transplant and you bleed out, he's sure as fuck getting sued, hauled before the board, possible jail time. If you're steering a 4000 pound metal box around and nod off and somebody dies, it's not an "accident", it's a lack of vigilance.